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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28185432">Something Amiss</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_Got_Lost/pseuds/I_Got_Lost'>I_Got_Lost</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Creature Fic, Creature Harry Potter, Creature Inheritance, Dark Harry, Eldritch, Gen, I mean kinda?, Just Blame Magic, Master of Death (Harry Potter), Master of Death Harry Potter, Morally Grey Harry Potter, Morally Grey Hermione Granger, Morally Grey Ron Weasley, Smart Ron Weasley, Universe Alteration, idk - Freeform, look im figuring this out too</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-05-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 21:28:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>16,241</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28185432</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_Got_Lost/pseuds/I_Got_Lost</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry Potter is cold.<br/>(He is always cold.)<br/>Harry Potter was placed with the Durselys to hide him away.<br/>It was unfortunate, but the wards took this one step further. Lily Potter nee Evans was rushed. The protection she had cast was shoddy and slapped together in an act of desperation, fear, and sheer spite.<br/>Her baby would live and her baby would be hidden.<br/>The wards allowed nothing less.<br/>...***...<br/>This is not a story of a brave Boy-Who-Lived. This is not a story of the Boy Who Lived at all.<br/>Harry Potter was cold and no one seemed to notice.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>68</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>461</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Blue Lips</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>First, Hazzardkitty and Popcorn, congrats, you have your hp fic. YAY<br/>Second, no, i have no idea whats going on either.<br/>Third, I've been reading a lot of 'dark harry' fics recently and while I've been having a lot of fun, they haven't been exactly what I wanted either, and then I was looking at a blank page and boom, fic. (wish this worked for my other fics)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Harry Potter is cold.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(He is always cold.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>On a cold November morning, while the grass glistened with frost Petunia Dursely nee Evans opened her front door and promptly screamed loud enough to wake the dead. Unfortunately, this action did not shoo away the bundle on her doorstep, nor did it sort out the situation Petunia was forced to read through tear glazed eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her sister was dead.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her nephew was abandoned on her front porch amid frost and the beginning of a soft dusting of snow.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia read the letter once, twice, three times, and then promptly cursed the uselessness of wixen. Petunia scooped the bundle up, shuddered at the cold dampness of the cloth, and thanked whatever god was watching over her Pagan sister's wayward child that the cold had not done in the babe. The blue tinge to his lips is noticeable, and as Veron watches with wide eyes and a sleepy Dudley on his hip, Petunia cuddles the babe close. In a perfect world, the blue lips, pale ears, and pale fingers would turn to a warm red and the child would gurgle happily as Petunia warmed him up and gave him a warm meal.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This, of course, is not a perfect world.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(In a perfect world, Lily and James Potter would not be dead and Harry would not have been abandoned on the front porch of his Aunt’s mundane home.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The blue does not fade.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia did not notice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One might think it was due to her blood, (or at least the lack of magical blood.) One might even wonder if her blindness to blue lips and slowly blackening fingertips was due to the stress of her sister's death. Maybe it was even due to having not just one, but two toddlers to worry about.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead, the answer is something far more sinister. Petunia Dursely, a squib by blood and therefore entirely able to be influenced by bloodwards and spell work, was unable to notice anything overly unusual with her nephew. The wards wouldn’t let her. So, Petunia only ever noticed two things, the things the wards could not hide with a nudge to her thoughts. She only ever saw the jagged lightning strike starting on the right side of Harry’s temple and clawing down across his nose to the tip of his left cheek, and his </span>
  <em>
    <span>green </span>
  </em>
  <span>eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Her sister’s eyes.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Later, she will notice how Harry will sit beside Dudley and her little boy’s toys </span>
  <em>
    <span>floated </span>
  </em>
  <span>around him and she will close her eyes and </span>
  <em>
    <span>weep</span>
  </em>
  <span>. (The only reason she does not scream is because Dudley looked so happy and Harry did not seem bothered by his cousin’s joy.) She expected nothing less from her sister's blood but she hadn't wanted </span>
  <em>
    <span>Her</span>
  </em>
  <span> type under this roof.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Veron had been told of her sister's world long before Petunia had agreed to marry him. (The possibility of their children having </span>
  <em>
    <span>Her </span>
  </em>
  <span>gift was enough for Petunia to warn her lover. ) So Harry's magic hadn't been too much of a shock. (Petunia was not a good woman but this was her </span>
  <em>
    <span>nephew. </span>
  </em>
  <span>This was her sister’s little boy. How could she refuse him?)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But, it was the little things that piled up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry never cried. Harry never seemed to sleep. He never laughed, babbled, screamed, or even so munched as </span>
  <em>
    <span>twitched</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Petunia's nephew sat in his bed and he </span>
  <em>
    <span>stared</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He stared as Dudley cried for his mother. He stared as Petunia read bedtime stories and soothed away bad dreams. He stared as Dudley played games and laughed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He stared.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little boy with </span>
  <em>
    <span>green </span>
  </em>
  <span>eyes and dark lines scarred across his face looked like a wraith, and Petunia could always feel his </span>
  <em>
    <span>green eyes </span>
  </em>
  <span>drilling into her skin. His eyes pick apart her soul and the whispers of the wards make her blood </span>
  <em>
    <span>freeze.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(Harry Potter is always </span>
  <em>
    <span>cold.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And Petunia, who never once admitted to being a good person, listened to the whispers of the wards. Listened to the whispers that urged her to </span>
  <em>
    <span>hide away.</span>
  </em>
  <span> And Petunia Dursely, who no one had ever thought to check if she was a muggle or a squib, did exactly that.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>She hid Harry away.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Some people have skeletons in their closet. Petunia had a whole boy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry Potter haunted number 4, Privet Drive. He glided into rooms and stood in corners. He lived in the shadows and wandered through the halls. Locking him away under the stairs did nothing. He did not stay behind locked doors. He climbed out from under beds and disappeared into the darkness of closets. Harry Potter haunted the Dursley household and the Dursleys did their best to pretend the boy never existed at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(For Dudley, this was all great fun. Some kids had imaginary friends to play with, Dudley had his green-eyed cousin.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For the most part, this worked rather well. Harry was not hit while in the Dursley house. One did not hit what did not exist, after all. He had all the access to food and water that he could want, and he was allowed to go to school. He had clothes and sometimes they didn’t fit, but growing boys hardly ever fit any of their clothes anyway.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He did not have friends, not that he seemed to care one way or another, and he had perfectly average marks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Perfectly average.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry Potter glided through life like a ghost. Petunia pretended she did not hear the sharp </span>
  <em>
    <span>crack </span>
  </em>
  <span>that echoed whenever the boy moved too fast. Just as she pretended not to see too sharp teeth and bright </span>
  <em>
    <span>green </span>
  </em>
  <span>eyes. The wards ensured that Harry Potter was safe from all that might harm him but the wards were designed to do one thing in particular.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry Potter was placed with the Durselys </span>
  <em>
    <span>to hide him away.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>It was unfortunate, but the wards took this one step further. Lily Potter nee Evans was rushed. The protection she had cast was shoddy and slapped together in an act of desperation, fear, and sheer spite.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her baby would live and her baby would be </span>
  <em>
    <span>hidden.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The wards allowed nothing less.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then, Harry Potter turned eleven.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Post Owls</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I HAVE PLOT!<br/>That isn't to say that i didn't have plot earlier but now i have an actual idea of where this is going and how to write the damn thing. So i mean, there's that.<br/>Anyway, happy holidays or happy end of the year, which ever you would prefer,<br/>AND<br/>As always, have fun, enjoy, and dont shoot me!<br/>-Lost</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Harry is standing in the corner of the kitchen.</p><p>
  <span>Petunia pretends her hands do not shake as she scrubs the dishes. (There is nothing wrong with Harry Potter. There is nothing </span>
  <em>
    <span>wrong</span>
  </em>
  <span> with Harry Potter.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry stands at her hip.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia does not jump. Not anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What do you want, boy?” Petunia scowls as she scrubs harder at the casserole dish. (Her voice </span>
  <em>
    <span>does not</span>
  </em>
  <span> shake.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Lily was never so </span>
  <em>
    <span>strange.</span>
  </em>
  <span> It must be the influence of </span>
  <em>
    <span>that boy.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aunt.” Harry rasps. His voice skitters across her skin and licks at her ears with sandpaper tongues and Petunia resists the urge to shudder. The boy never says much and in the darkest corner of her heart, Petunia can only ever be grateful for his silence. “Owl.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Something in Petunia's heart </span>
  <em>
    <span>cracks</span>
  </em>
  <span> even as her lungs spasm. (“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Mum, look! It’s an owl! Do you think Lily sent us another letter? Mum, do you think i could go next year? Mum look!”</span>
  </em>
  <span>) she scrubs harder at the spotless casserole dish. Pretending that her sister did not exist had gotten her nowhere but misery and heartache. Pretending that her sister's son did not exist, got her lurking figures and heartbreaking green eyes staring out from under her son's bed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia puts the casserole dish down.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry stands at her side. The light overhead flickers just enough to make Petunia squint. There’s no point in calling an electrician, the lights will spontaneously work the moment Harry walks away. (They always do.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia takes a prudent step back and the light overhead flickers back on, burning down on her like a judge’s podium. (Petunia pretends that her shadow is bending the right way. Petunia always pretends her shadow is bending the right way.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia pretends not to notice the shadows in the kitchen are long, never mind the fact it is midday. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia is very good at pretending (nothing) everything is perfectly </span>
  <em>
    <span>normal.</span>
  </em>
</p><p><span>Harry stares up at her with</span> <span>green eyes and lightning slashed across his face. He is small, too small. He is nothing like her precious Dudley who is so much like his handsome father. He is nothing like her sister. Her sister who had fiery hair and a temper to match. Her sister who was always so </span><em><span>perfect.</span></em></p><p>
  <span>(Harry is everything like </span>
  <em>
    <span>that boy</span>
  </em>
  <span>.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In his hands, is a rather disgruntled owl.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In any other world, this would be a scene of laughter and smiles. The owl looks indignant. Its beak snaps in a chattering screech and the feathers are puffed up like old Ms Fig's cats when cornered by Marge’s dog Ripper. In another world, Petunia would look at the official Hogwarts Post Owl and wonder how Harry managed to catch the thing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In this world, Petunia jerks a hand towards the dining room and does not wince as her nephew's gaze drops from her face down to the owl. In this world, Petunia can only be grateful Harry has not brought her the owl </span>
  <em>
    <span>in his teeth.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry slips into the dining room with a jerky sort of grace that Petunia has long since stopped noticing. He does not sink into a chair and Petunia watches him with a cautionary short of gaze as she sits at the table. Petunia knows, in the same way she knows that everything is (not) fine, that this is (not) normal. She should not be watching her nephew as of he were a feral thing Dudley had brought in from the garden. She should not be so </span>
  <em>
    <span>concerned.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry places the owl down on the table top but does not release the poor creature.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Petunia does not look at her nephew's </span>
  <em>
    <span>hungry </span>
  </em>
  <span>eyes. Both of them know, if the boy releases the owl, Petunia will not be presented with a squawking bird next time. Next time, She will be presented with it's gnawed bones.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia's hands do not shake as she reaches for the owl's talons and bit by bit, claims the letter she can see hidden away under the fluff. She does not flinch as she sees that </span>
  <em>
    <span>freakish </span>
  </em>
  <span>crest and she does not blink at seeing </span>
  <em>
    <span>Mr. Harry Potter, Shadows In 4 Privet Drive. </span>
  </em>
  <span>She does not blink at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boy.” She says firmly. (Not </span>
  <em>
    <span>Harry</span>
  </em>
  <span>, never </span>
  <em>
    <span>Harry. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Boy is enough for a ….)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Harry is a perfectly normal little boy.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boy, do you remember what I told you about my sister?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For a moment, Petunia isn't sure the boy hears her. His hands still grip the owl and at this point, she's not sure if it is normal for owls to fall so quiet or to stay so still. She can only be grateful Veron and Dudley are at the shops. Harry hugs the owl close, pinning it under one arm as his free hand drags a finger a touch too harshly across the feathers. The owl, a rather smart creature Petunia has to admit, does not protest the manhandling. Petunia is not sure the poor thing would survive Harry's errant reaction if it did.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Magic.” The boy whispers, his too bright eyes shining out from under his fringe.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The word still scrubs against Petunia's skin with a violent sort of jealousy even after all this time and it takes considerable effort not to snap and snarl at the boy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” Petunia breathes, thinking of floating toys and disappearing nephews, “magic.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry's eyes drop to the envelope. “School?” the word drops like knives across Petunia’s skin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia is not typically an impulsive person. She is not like Lily, jumping headlong into whatever struck her fancy. Petunia usually considers every possible angle and reacts accordingly. But Harry is staring at her with green eyes and she has an invitation to that freakish school in her hands and nothing (something) is wrong with Harry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily had always complained every summer about having to go to the wizarding bank. She had complained about the goblins and how they always seemed to know everything. Petunia had never listened, of course, but that did not mean she did not know what she had to do.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Opening the letter and scanning the paper is little more then a formality. Petunia would never forget the contents of Lily's letter, not as long as she lived, and aside from a nonsensical page of school supplies, the letter had not changed since Petunia had been a child.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily had been given her letter by a witch, Petunia remembered. The woman had whisked her wand through the air and Petunia's doll had been changed into a silver button and back again. Her parents had been ever so pleased that Lily had a place of prestige in school. That Lily would be shipped off and hidden away for almost ten months of the year.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily had been given a letter by a witch. Harry was given his by an owl.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia pursed her lips. Perhaps it was a good thing Harry had yet to release the poor creature considering the end of the letter mentioned that the school would await Harry's owl. (Of course these people couldn’t just send post the regular way! That would make sense, after all. And, of course, these were the same people who thought it a good idea to leave a toddler on a porch in November.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boy,” Petunia's mouth dried out, her lips cracking as she choked even the thought of what she was about to offer, “do you want to go to Hogwarts?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The paper in her hands crumbles around the edges and Petunia cannot look at the boy. She can't. No one had given Lily the option. No one had asked her if she wanted to go. She was just bundled up and thrown onto a train and Petunia had not heard from her directly until the following summer. (Petunia had begged to follow her sister, but that was neither here nor there.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one had given Lily a choice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dudley liked his cousin. Dudley hung off of every movement Harry made and chattered enough to fill the silence the boy never seemed to breach. Dudley liked his cousin and maybe it was old regrets and broken promises that made Petunia pick worriedly at the edge of the letter before she asked again. “Do you want to go to Hogwarts?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They could send him to Smeltings with Dudley. It would take nothing to send the boy off with Dudders. She didn’t have to separate them. She didn’t have to tear them apart like she and Lily had been.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She could stop this nonsense right now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Magic.” Harry coos at the owl, his teeth flashing a bit too close to the feathers for Petunia's liking.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boy. No blood in the house.” Petunia snaps absently even as she heaves out a sigh. The boy is too much like his mother, she supposed. Just like darling Lily, the boy would go off and stuff his pockets with frog spawn and shriek freakish words to create freakish things for freakish purposes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(She shouldn’t be too surprised.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What follows is an act of spite Petunia hasn’t created in years. She writes out Harry's confirmation answer on the back of an old tear away day calendar and stuffed it in a return to sender envelope Veron sometimes brought home from the office. It is a horrid response and it is all too </span>
  <em>
    <span>muggle.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Petunia hasn’t felt such glee since she had last been at the local tea social and Mrs. Moore had been asked to leave after supposedly (obviously) stealing away another member's prized recipe for bread pudding.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The owl in Harry's hands seems to grasp the concept of freedom just from the sight of the letter in Petunia's hands. For all that the boy's nails (claws, the boy had </span>
  <em>
    <span>claws</span>
  </em>
  <span>) had to be ripping into fragile flesh and drawing up blood, the owl was plenty willing to suddenly start causing a ruckus.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lurching up to her feet, Petunia drew on decades old memories of flinging post owls out the kitchen windows in Cokesworth and all but stomped to the front door. A quick click of her fingers had the boy's head </span>
  <em>
    <span>cracking </span>
  </em>
  <span>towards her and Petunia threw the letter out into the front yard. The boy released the creature with a blank face and Petunia decidedly did not look at his gleaming (hungry) eyes as the owl caught the letter before it hit the ground and flapped away with an indignant screech.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There is an old itch Petunia had long since thought she learned to ignore, tearing chicks away from her willpower. She still remembers going with Lily and their parents into Diagon Alley. She still remembers the colour, the chaos, and the </span>
  <em>
    <span>beauty.</span>
  </em>
  <span> (Sometimes, even years later, her dreams echo with the ache of the memory.) It is probably a good thing Dudley is with Veron at the shops.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Petunia brings the boy to the Alley alone, without Dudley, maybe they can avoid the whole problem. If she said no to Dudley. If she took the blame. If she made it clear that it was her fault Dudley could not go with the boy, then at least Dudley would not blame the boy. (Petunia wasn’t doing this for </span>
  <em>
    <span>him. </span>
  </em>
  <span>For the </span>
  <em>
    <span>boy. </span>
  </em>
  <span>She was doing this because brilliant green eyes peered out from under beds and pinned her under thin steel pins that dragged lines into her skin. She was doing this because maybe, just maybe, if </span>
  <em>
    <span>her </span>
  </em>
  <span>parents had said it was </span>
  <em>
    <span>their fault </span>
  </em>
  <span>then maybe she wouldn’t have blamed </span>
  <em>
    <span>Lily.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(She was doing this because she knew what it meant to never receive a letter.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(She was doing this because she knew what it meant to stand on a platform and know you were never going to get on that train.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia grabs her purse and keys off the table in the back hall and points for the boy to skulk towards the car. This is probably impulsive. This is probably a terrible idea. This could go wrong in so many ways.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But, Petunia remembers a little body tucked onto her welcome mat. Petunia remembers how Harry </span>
  <em>
    <span>clung </span>
  </em>
  <span>to her Dudders. Petunia remembers how Lily used to look whenever she got home for the hols.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She tucks Harry's acceptance letter into her purse and Petunia forces herself to climb into the car. She had never told Veron but after Lily had died, in those first numbing and horrid months, she used to bundle Dudley and the boy into the car and drive. Inevitably, she would find herself in the same rundown lot. Dudley would be asleep in the back and the boy would be staring at her with glinting eyes and black lightning across his face. She would watch him in the rearview and then Petunia would look through the windshield.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Leaky Cauldron had never changed, even though the war.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Wizards as a whole, were arrogant and useless. Petunia had never once changed her opinion of that. But she wasn’t sure if it was deliberate or not that they had inadvertently refused her the right to bury her sister. She and Lily had never spoken much once Petunia had turned eleven, but Lily had sent her letters. (Petunia had kept every single one.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia knew what wizards did to muggles. Lily had written of Dark Lords and Death Eaters. Lily had warned about what had happened to muggleborns. Lily had written of wars and of hiding and of fear and Petunia had never said a word back. Those letters had been delivered by wandering deer and big black dogs leashed by scarred young boys and Petunia had never thought her sister more of a witch then in those few years.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then her sister died and any hope of learning about what was happening in Lily's world shriveled up and died with her. Petunia knew that there was a war. She did not know if this war had been won. Finding her sister’s grave had never been more important than keeping the boys safe. She would not find herself killed just so she could see what would probably be a small stone on an overgrown and wild plot of land.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Lily had never been anyone important after all. She was only Petunia's sister.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia never asked to see Lily's grave but she could not stop herself from driving to the Leaky Cauldron and parking in the rundown car park across the street. She had never dared to go often and she never stayed for long, but this was the place she had lost her sister. This was the gateway to Lily's world and if Petunia could not stand at her grave and weep, then she would sit in her car and pray over old regrets.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia could find her way to the Leaky Cauldron deaf and blind, but this was the first time she would actually go inside since she and Lily had been children. She can't help but wonder if this is all a mistake. Yet, as she pulls up to the Leaky Cauldron, she realizes it’s a bit late now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry has not made a peep during the entire ride and Petunia is so used to Dudders making endless chatter that the hand that slips into hers when she steps out of the car almost causes her to screech.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry's hands are boney and clammy (cold. So cold. Her skin is turning </span>
  <em>
    <span>black.</span>
  </em>
  <span>) and Petunia valiantly strides forward with a blank scarred little ghost clinging to her hand and hidden away in her skirts. Her heels click off the cobble and the boy makes no sound at all. Every light they step by, flickers. Every meter counting down the parking fees on the street spins out of control on the clock face. The payphone sparks. The traffic lights up ahead crack and smoke.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Petunia has had long practice in </span>
  <em>
    <span>not noticing.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For all her bravo, Petunia still hesitates outside of the pub. The boy's hand is still tangled in hers and Petunia </span>
  <em>
    <span>wails </span>
  </em>
  <span>behind her ribs. Her sister. Her darling sister. Dead due to a madman. Left to rot in a field. Lord knows if anyone avenged her. Lord knows if anyone cared. She could be killed (or worse) the very moment she walks into the pub. </span>
  <em>
    <span>That boy </span>
  </em>
  <span>had always made it perfectly clear she had dirty blood, and Petunia knew what happened to those with dirty blood. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The </span>
  <em>
    <span>cold </span>
  </em>
  <span>from her side wavers and Petunia turns quick enough to see the boy shiver into existence in front of a little girl. Petunia's mouth dries out. The boy </span>
  <em>
    <span>never </span>
  </em>
  <span>approaches people. He doesn’t like </span>
  <em>
    <span>people. </span>
  </em>
  <span>(Except for precious Dudders, but that was something neither here nor there.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sun shifts behind a cloud, throwing the scene into darkness and Petunia would take a step forward except…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(The boy lurches forward with sharp teeth and </span>
  <em>
    <span>there is blood on the kitchen floor….</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(The boy wraps himself around Dudely's shoulders, grabs at his wrist, and Dudely laughs even as the boy's fingers grind bone together…)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Dudley </span>
  <em>
    <span>shrieks </span>
  </em>
  <span>and Petunia rushes forward but </span>
  <em>
    <span>the boy </span>
  </em>
  <span>already has Marge's pup pinned by </span>
  <em>
    <span>the throat</span>
  </em>
  <span>…)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia couldn’t stop the boy even if she tried.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia waits for the invariable scream. Waits to hear the growl and the </span>
  <em>
    <span>slurp </span>
  </em>
  <span>and the sheer </span>
  <em>
    <span>happiness.</span>
  </em>
  <span> (She waits because at least it is not her.) Only…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy has wrapped himself around the girl. Somehow, he has managed to place himself behind her and tuck his chin into the junction between her shoulder and neck. She doesn’t even see a hint of teeth. His eyes gleam between the strands of hair flying about the girl's head and his hands are tucked around her in such a way Petunia does not need much to imagine him leaping over the girl’s head and screaming </span>
  <em>
    <span>mine!</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Witch.” The boy croons.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sheer delight in that rasp of tongues makes Petunia understand why so many people burned under the title of witch. There is (something) nothing wrong with Harry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then, with the boy dragging claws up her wrists and his teeth snapping beside her vulnerable throat, the girl positively beams. “Mum!” she shouts as she looks between Harry and the bewildered couple Petunia had not noticed in the commotion. “Mum, Dad! I made a friend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Witch.” Harry confirms with a gurgle of broken glass and spiderwebs. He looks at Petunia the same way he looked at that poor owl. All his teeth are on display. “My Witch.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia clutches at her cross strung about her neck as if the flimsy metal will protect her from the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Hunger </span>
  </em>
  <span>in those green (had Lily's eyes been so bright) </span>
  <em>
    <span>green</span>
  </em>
  <span> eyes. (Lily had never been so </span>
  <em>
    <span>strange.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia looks away.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(There should have been three graves.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Petunia never sees the lips that are a deep </span>
  <em>
    <span>blue.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. New Friends and Owls</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Another chapter! Yay!<br/>On a side note, happy late Whatever to anyone who celebrated this past year and I hope you all stayed safe.<br/>As always, have fun, enjoy, and please don't shoot me.<br/>-Lost</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Hermione can’t stop smiling. The grin pulls at her cheeks and makes her teeth ache but she can’t help it. She had turned eleven. Had suffered through a birthday of sitting at a table waiting for her so-called friends to appear so they could have cake.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had waited.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And waited.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And waited.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And….</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then she had gone back to school, put her nose in a book and refused to look up even when Millie Borge screamed or Ernie Kepts tripped in the doorway and heaved on Mrs Billards’ shoes. She hadn’t blinked as her teacher clicked over her missing desk or so much as twitched when her notes were smeared with mud and ink.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione never reacted much to anything anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione was willing to put up with a lot. She knew when to swallow her tongue and bend her head. She knew when she could </span>
  <em>
    <span>push </span>
  </em>
  <span>and the other girl's reputations would topple. She knew how to tilt her head, bat her eyes, and use ‘no sir' and ‘yes ma'am'. Hermione knew exactly how far she could poke a problem until the teachers told her to stop. She knew how to hide sharpened pencils and razor blades in the folds of her braid, and she knew that Donny Hards liked to reach out and </span>
  <em>
    <span>tug </span>
  </em>
  <span>pigtails.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione was willing to out up with a lot, but </span>
  <em>
    <span>no one touched her books.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione never did anything so vulgar as to hit. One didn’t hit girls after all. But Hermione knew how to blink away tears and stare in silence. She knew how to make her very presence annoying and she knew how to time it. (Hermione had sent more kids home in a suspension after a classmate had ripped a book and gotten Hermione banned from the library for a week because of it.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione wasn’t good with people, not really. Girls didn’t make sense and boys were worse than useless, and there was never anyone </span>
  <em>
    <span>interesting</span>
  </em>
  <span>. She had tried to make friends, she really had, but no one ever wanted to read and she had never seen the point in playing useless games like football or hockey.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione had never quite </span>
  <em>
    <span>fit</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She knew her mother had cried over this. Knew that her mum wanted the best for her. And bless her dad, he tried. But his solution was to give Hermione a pink Hello Kitty bat for her birthday and showed her how to hold it to make dents in 2x4s. He then showed her how to fold her hands into a fist and how to punch without breaking her thumb. She loved her dad, but he had never picked up the subtleties of how women fought each other.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Still, the baseball bat had been enough to make Ernie back off for a whole month. Hermione had actually laughed at that realisation.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But, Hermione had never fit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fact she had magic had not been hard to figure out. She had known about that for ages after all. One could only float their books to their bed and create a light beside their pillow so many times before one questioned </span>
  <em>
    <span>how.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Between reading silently in her room and learning how to keep her head down, Hermione had never had many outbursts of raw emotion and she knew enough to recognise that her ‘magic' was easier to control when she was calm, rather than worked up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The letter sent to her house (and later verified by a rather stern looking witch) along with an explanatory packet of what a witch was, had helped smooth things along rather nicely. The magic had explained so many things her parents had dismissed and Hermione had been thrilled to know that she wasn’t alone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Hermione still didn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>fit.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(The witch who had stopped by had told her she would be a ‘claw for sure' but Hermione wasn’t too sure about being called a weapon thank you very much.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Hermione looked over her shoulder to see a boy with blue lips, killer green eyes, and a slashing scar folding over his brow and nose. She looked at the boy who was </span>
  <em>
    <span>too cold </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>too still </span>
  </em>
  <span>and had a smile </span>
  <em>
    <span>far too large</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wasn’t sure how she felt about the way his hands curled around her or even if she liked how he nuzzled into her neck. But he looked at the witch in front of them (what else could the woman be? Standing in front of the pub like that with a boy like this?) and called Hermione </span>
  <em>
    <span>his.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>And, well, what else could she do but claim him back?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy prowled around her as Hermione walked through the pub and as her parents and the long neck witch spoke in a low tone. Few people looked up and even fewer people stared when the boy </span>
  <em>
    <span>clicked </span>
  </em>
  <span>his nails along the back of a chair in a sharp and menacing </span>
  <em>
    <span>clack.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Although, Hermione did have to give credit, where credit was due, because the bartender placed his rag down long enough to lean over the bar and give them both a quick look over. He didn’t seem phased by the boy's slow stare or how Hermione tangled her hand with the boy's the long the silence dragged on.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Muggleborns?” he eventually asked, his face </span>
  <em>
    <span>twisting </span>
  </em>
  <span>into some emotion Hermione couldn’t quite name. (And didn’t that pull at her. She knew things. Hermione always knew things. If she didn’t know things then she would be tricked, and twisted  and hurt, and played and …. Well. Hermione </span>
  <em>
    <span>knew </span>
  </em>
  <span>things.) Hermione opened her mouth to say something, anything, when a hand came down heavily on her shoulder.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“First generation, Tom.” The witch said, her voice hard and her eyes flinty. She stared about the room as if daring </span>
  <em>
    <span>anyone </span>
  </em>
  <span>to speak against her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Hermione hadn’t seen her pull a wand but surely not all magic needed one? And Hermione certainly knew she needed to learn </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>spell.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And the boy is a second generation. His mother did not die in your little war to be called anything so vulgar as </span>
  <em>
    <span>that.</span>
  </em>
  <span>” The witch continued, her eyes narrowing further as the pub suddenly became as quiet as a library.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>War?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What war?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione blinked and gave a subtle look to the boy. Well, the war couldn’t have been too long ago considering the boy was probably her age. Thinking quickly, Hermione gave the boy's fingers a squeeze and stepped a bit closer. He seemed to like it when she was close, if only because then he hid away his teeth. She couldn’t imagine losing her mum, or her da. She'd probably be sad and a bit angry, if she were being completely honest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maybe that was why the boy was so touchy?</span>
</p><p>
  <span> Maybe he was hurt during the war?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione had read about trauma, after her mum had used the word in retaliation to a woman who had come in to the dentistry for a consultation on her shattered front teeth. It was an umbrella term and could be used for multiple things. But Hermione supposed the important thing was that trauma meant the boy had been hurt in some way and it probably was bad. But the important bit, Hermione figured as she looked up to the stern witch, was that </span>
  <em>
    <span>muggleborn </span>
  </em>
  <span>meant something bad.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Slowly, Tom nodded and Hermione was a bit puzzled to see a soft smile on his face. “Of course, of course.” He said as he gave a quick nod to a man near the back wall. “Professor Quirell here, was posted at this entry for all you first gens. He'll get you through to the alley.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione follows the gesture to see a figure hunched over in a darkened corner of the pub. For a man that was supposed to be helping, he appeared awfully uninterested in stepping up. Nor did he appear to be happy to have her attention on him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well, Hermione had never been one to sit idle, so slipping away from the Witch’s hand, Hermione dragged the boy with her to the table. “Hello,” she said smartly as she offered her other hand to the man, “my name is Hermione Granger. I would like to access Diagon Alley please.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man gave her a long stare from under his turban and Hermione wasn’t sure, but it looked like there might have been a small sneer twisting through his lips.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And your, your, your, f-f-friend?” he stuttered over the words, but Hermione was patient enough to wait for the whole sentence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione smiled brightly, it was wonderful that people could already tell she and the boy were good friends. But, her smile dimmed, what was the boy's name?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy hadn't looked up from their tangled hands and when Hermione nudged him at a prompt to respond, the boy all but curled around her side, his nose tucking into the side of her throat again. Well, there was nothing for it then. She wasn’t about to force the boy to talk when he didn’t want to and the boy’s witch obviously knew who he was, so she wasn’t too concerned about never learning the boy’s name. Turning back to the table, Hermione gave the man a halfhearted shrug. “Sorry sir, I guess he's shy.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The professor’s eyes narrowed and something with too many legs slipped down Hermione's back at the look that made his lips thin into bloodless lines. Everything in her told her to move, to step away, to scream and scream and…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy gave a soft gravelly growl and his fingers pressed half moons into her skin. The scream bubbled up on the tip of her tongue and she could taste blood on her tongue and ash in her teeth. There was something </span>
  <em>
    <span>wrong.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy lifted his head and </span>
  <em>
    <span>snarled.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The sensation stopped and Hermione gave the top of the boy’s head a wild eyed stare. The boy didn’t look at her as he pulled his lips back from his teeth but Hermione didn’t need him to look at her to feel the short squeeze the boy gave her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ri.” The boy bit out, the name sounding a bit like broken glass and cracking stone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Professor Quirrell seemed to understand that he wasn’t going to get anything else from the boy. Around them, the pub had gone eerily silent. And Hermione wasn’t sure if it was because of Ri's response or if it was something the Professor had done and Hermione had missed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He's certainly a Slytherin." A woman called out from a booth in the corner. “No other house is that possessive!” the woman leaned over the side of the table and gave Hermione a carefully crafted smile. “Anyone want to bet on the boy? The pot can be claimed at the winter hols when he comes through for a resupply.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione didn’t miss the wink the witch sent her, or the sharp gesture for her to leave.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The pub sprang to life and Hermione found herself flattened against the table as Ri spun around and snarled at the noise. To be fair, Hermione couldn’t blame him as she clapped her hands over her ears and gave a desperate glance over to her parents. Her mum grabbed at her wrist and shot the professor a look, even as her father herded Ri's witch over to the table. The professor seemed to wilt under the collective gaze of three annoyed adults and he hastily scrambled to his feet to dart to the wall.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He tapped the bricks too quickly for Hermione to grasp the pattern and she nearly fell through the sudden gate onto her nose when the bricks flipped and folded away. Luckily, her mother caught her and Hermione had no time to stare as her mum pulled her along into the most dazzling place she had ever seen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were mannequins waving in windows, signs quickly changing colours and boasting prices of wares inside. Hermione had been to a medieval festival before and she supposed that was the closest equivalent she could compare the Alley in front of her towards. Bags floated behind a witch as the woman darted after a child and two teens jabbed each other with wands.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Alley was amazing and Hermione’s hands had not itched to touch everything she saw as in that moment. All the things she could learn, all the magic she could cast. All the things she could do! It was enough to make her want to cry in happiness.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Boy! No! No teeth!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione spun to see Ri's witch smacking Ri on the back of his head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione's mum took a step forward, her face tightening in anger but Ri turned and Hermione could see a small snowy owl in his hands. The owl appeared to be rather surprised to be caught, but Hermione watched in awe as the creature clicked its beak at Ri and cooed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione's mum drew up short.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How did you do that?” Hermione said slowly, her eyes flicking between Harry and the white owl. She had only been distracted for a moment. Ri should not have been able to catch an owl in that short time frame. He should have been able to catch an owl. Period. But that wasn’t the point.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Caught her.” Ri said, one hand letting go of the owl to gently brush the fluff under its chin with stiff fingers. “Pretty hunter.” He praised the owl as it preened under his gaze.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey!” The shout cut through the din of the Alley (and Hermione swore she heard her mum mutter ‘what now?’) and a young man jogged through the shoppers. On his hands were rather clunky leather gloves and Hermione couldn’t help but stare at the scratches littering his cheeks and upper arms. “Oh good! You caught her. That blasted owl keeps escaping whenever I clean her cage. This one doesn’t like magic so I have to do it the </span>
  <em>
    <span>muggle </span>
  </em>
  <span>way.” The man finished with a sneer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was that word again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Muggle.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri's witch seemed to take offence to it. “Well, if you don’t like doing it the mundane way, then maybe you shouldn’t have her at all!” she snapped, sounding a bit like one of Hermione's school teachers when someone had tried to put a tack on her chair. Hermione's spine straightened of its own accord. Ri's witch nodded and began to stride forward, her fingers clicking together for Ri to follow her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hermione skipped after them with a grin. “Bye!” she waved at the man, giggling slightly at the way his mouth remained open. “You should shut your mouth,” she advised as her mum and da began to stagger after her, “I don’t think humans like to eat live bugs from the air.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri latched onto Hermione’s hand and Hermione stared as the owl struggled out of Ri’s grip and flew up onto Ri’s shoulder. He didn’t seem to blink, but Hermione gave the owl a bit of a pout. The owl stared back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri’s witch turned and gave the three of them a stern glance. “Do keep up.” She snapped. “The bank won’t stay open forever.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Into the Realm of the Goblins</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry my dudes, computer broke, files were lost, and I'm still trying to salvage the rest. Thank god I take notes by hand though. Anyway, new chapter, moving forward, and plot is about to happen. YAY!<br/>As always, have fun, enjoy, and please don't shoot me.<br/>-Lost</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Petunia does not like the boy. She does not like him at all. (He has Lily’s eyes and Lily’s fingers. He has her silent smile and her…. The boy is so much like </span>
  <em>
    <span>her.</span>
  </em>
  <span> ) He is too freakish, too silent, too still, and too </span>
  <em>
    <span>sharp. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Petunia does not like the boy but the boy…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy...</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy has a hand tangled in her shirt. He has another hand stroking the feathers of the white feathery monstrosity on his shoulder, and she sees a third hand curled around the little witch's wrist. (Nothing is wrong. Everything is </span>
  <em>
    <span>perfectly ordinary.</span>
  </em>
  <span>) Petunia almost immediately regrets counting the boy's limbs when she had turned around and snapped at her gaggle to keep up.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>The boy has too many hands.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>There is a creeping tingle of skittering claws crawling down her spine and Petunia looks away from the boy's green eyes. She doesn’t bother to recount the hands. The boy only has two, after all. (There is nothing wrong with Harry Potter.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The alley has not changed in the twenty some odd years since Petunia had skipped in through the Leaky. The wares were still hocked by spelled signs and flashing beacons. The mannequins still danced in the windows, letters still flew unaccompanied through the air. Children ran amuck with ices held in one hand and countless magical items in the other. If Petunia had to pick one place to describe as the quintessential location of the magical world, she would point to the Alley without a thought. There was not a lick of sense in the entire place.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia forces herself to look back towards the boy. Out of the corner of her eye, she watches as the lanterns framing the branching alleys and highlighting the dark displays of the shops, smolder behind clear glass. The smokeless lights leak wisps of carbon, the ash floating down like black snow as the boy walks beneath them. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Her sister had never been so strange.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(There is nothing wrong with Harry Potter.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia very carefully, does not look down to see his too long shadow wiggling in the opposite direction. Nor does she particularly care to note how the boy has an eye trained on every shop they pass in the alley. (Petunia had cut his hair </span>
  <em>
    <span>once. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Veron could not convince her to do it again. The boy had his mother's eyes.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little witch guides the boy down the street and Petunia’s heart cracks a little bit more with every happy gasp the girl gives. She gives it six months before the girl loses that gleam in her eye. (Lord, she hopes the girl does not have a younger sister.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Grangers, the little witch's parents, had introduced themselves in the Leaky before that </span>
  <em>
    <span>freak </span>
  </em>
  <span>of a teacher had made a spectacle of himself. Honestly. To be terrified of a little boy! (Petunia purposefully does not think about the fact that the boy in question is her nephew.) But the Grangers, so new to the problem of magic, so naive about the evil freakish nature of the world they were about to set their daughter loose in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily had always started every trip to the bank and even just over two decades later, Petunia could do little else but follow in her footsteps. Petunia was not a kind woman and she had never deluded herself into thinking she was, but she had taken one look at the witch's parents after the boy had proven not to be hungry, and pitied them. The boy had claimed their daughter, they would never be free of the freak in the shadows now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bank looms overhead and Petunia walks through the doors with a quick nod to the goblin guard. Dirty little creatures they might be, but Petunia could not deny them to be oddly clever and a touch too crafty. Lily had always told her to go to the bank, for any trip or any problem. Petunia had always assumed it was because the nasty little buggers were not invested enough in humans (aside from their buisness) to bother with petty human disputes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petunia, long used to convincing herself everything is </span>
  <em>
    <span>normal, </span>
  </em>
  <span>does not flinch at the picture the bank presents. (The cupboard under the stairs is far more terrifying.) The goblins are short little creatures, with twisted ears, too </span>
  <em>
    <span>sharp </span>
  </em>
  <span>teeth, beady little eyes, and gnarled little hands.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unlike most people who walk through the door, Petunia sees eyes blinking down from the vaulted ceilings, twisted limbs curling around podiums and shadows, and the way certain occupants of the room lingered a touch too long or moved a bit too quickly. Petunia hears the rasp of dry tongues striking over bloodied lips, hears the clink of coin dripping magics and shadows, hears the rumble of gobbledygook, and the slow but steady beat of the drums beneath her feet.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But there is a difference between </span>
  <em>
    <span>seeing </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>noticing.</span>
  </em>
  <span> And Petunia noticed nothing out of the ordinary.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(If Petunia had looked back, she would have seen Harry stop just outside of the door with Hermonie still wrapped in his embrace. She would have seen the stare the goblin guard gave her nephew and the way her nephew's shadow all but climbed the guard. She would have seen how her nephew gave a slow smile before bowing low.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(But Petunia did not turn and she did not notice.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(The boy notices </span>
  <em>
    <span>everything.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is pure luck that Petunia can walk straight up to the teller. The Gangers are only a few steps behind her, and Petunia keeps them in the corner of her eye, (the normal must stick together after all) so much so that the goblin leaning over the podium to stare down at her, assumes the muggles to be a part of her group. Petunia earns a mark in her favour when she does not flinch.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I am here,” Petunia says, her voice high and shrill, “to access the Evans account on my nephew's behalf.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were many things lost during the war. One of the most common happened to be mail. Lily, desperate and afraid, had cobbled together a wedding and sent out invitations in less then a week. Petunia, a squib in the muggle world, never received the invite. As far as she knew, her nephew was, in fact, a bastard.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was the only reason, she thought, that the boy had been sent to her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy's name might have been Harry Potter but that did not mean the inheritance would go to a bastard child of a young woman whoring herself out in the middle of a war. (Even eleven years later, Petunia cannot curb her tongue on the inaccurate nature of her sister. Petunia, a woman with a spine held straight with spite and envy, cannot help but think the worst of everything.)It also helped that Petunia had not, in fact, known who Lily had laid with. She had thought it might be the Potter boy but depending on how the war had gone, the Potter boy might have just lent Lily his name rather than his hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No. It was smarter to ask for Lily's account.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In another world, it would be amusing the way both the goblin and Petunia turned to stare at the boy. In this one, the boy and the little witch </span>
  <em>
    <span>appeared </span>
  </em>
  <span>at the bottom of the podium and the boy simply stared.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The goblin didn’t blink.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy’s lips pulled back from his teeth. (Little boys were supposed to have sharp incisors and pesky little triangles instead of flat blunted teeth. Baby teeth were much different then adult teeth after all.) His pesky fringe covered his eyes and Petunia nearly pinched his cheeks to bring some colour into the pale skin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Lord, if it turned out he was related to </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>boy…)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy is too pale by half and Petunia does not need some snobbish bint coming into her house trying to tell her how to raise her own child. Lily's son just needed a bit more of a firm hand, that’s all. Petunia does not like the freak. She does not like the boy at all. But she likes social service even less. The boy needs to look normal. At least, he needs to look normal in public. When she went home, the freak could go back to lurking in shadows and being locked away in his cupboard.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The goblin gave an odd choking snarl and Petunia couldn’t help the instinctive scuttle backwards. Mercifully, the Grangers also moved away from the little creature, although Mr. Granger had stepped in front of his wife. (Lord, Petunia had not wanted Veron to defend her in ages, but that little twisted </span>
  <em>
    <span>freak </span>
  </em>
  <span>made her skin crawl.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little witch was the one who broke the standoff. “What's so funny, Master Goblin?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The goblin gave her a long measured look and the little witch glared silently back, her hands tangled with the boy’s.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How about,” the goblin said, teeth flashing with every word, “we move this matter to somewhere more private?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was not a suggestion.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Above and Below</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello All!<br/>For those of you who noticed there was a mistake with Hermione's name, I promise it has been fixed. Thank you to those of you who were kind enough to point it out so nicely. This problem should be resolved and shouldn't happen again, but if my auto correct tries to slip in other spellings and I don't catch it, by all means, point it out. It might not be updated until the next chapter release, but it will be updated.<br/>Now, introducing Ron!<br/>YAY!<br/>Anyway, as always, have fun, enjoy, and please don't shoot me!<br/>-Lost</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Ronald Weasley was not a notable child. He had red hair that was just a touch too messy, a face full of freckles that hid smudges and dirt on his cheeks, and quick little fingers that were only matched by his quick brain. Ronald Weasley did not have a twin, he was not a girl, and he was not the eldest child. (He was not noticeable at all.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His parents loved him and he never doubted that, but Ronald Weasley was not a memorable child. And children who do not make themselves known, unfortunately are swept away in the cracks. Ron was not a memorable child, but sometimes he did memorable things.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ron.” Bill said, his wand held loosely in the hand that was messaging the corner of his temple. “Do I even want to know how you got here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron, a little boy with a very obviously missing canine tooth, blood coming out of one nostril, and a mulish expression set in the corners of his mouth, shrugged. “Prob’ly not.” He admitted without hesitation or shame.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Bill’s other hand came up to scrub at his eyes. (Ironically, this was the very expression their mother often gave them whenever she walked into the kitchen and found two or more boys curled around the stove and with big bright grins at three in the morning.) “Ron. You’re in Gringotts.” Bill said slowly, almost as if he were expecting Ron to burst into weepy apologies at any moment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Quite frankly, Ron failed to see what the problem was. Mi-Stake (not mis-take. Ron would not make that mistake again. What with the little goblin girl having taken his tooth in retaliation for that blunder) had told him to come by whenever he liked. It wasn’t his fault that the nearest entrance to the goblin enclave was through Gringrotts. Besides…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron nodded towards the Above. “I left a note!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Bill stared at him. (Ron didn’t like that much, it made him think there were smudges on his nose and that Mi-Stake was behind him ready to bash in his head with her smelting hammer.) And then Bill shook his head. “How? No, wait! Why?” He near begged. “Gods, mum is going to have my head for this.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron gave Bill a long look. “Why? I came here on my own.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And really, it wasn’t as if it was the first time. Ron had an agreement of sorts with the goblins, not that either party would admit it. The whole thing was more of a mutual understanding. Ron would come to the bank and wander through the halls of the Below. (Bill had once asked if Ron knew what he was doing and Ron rather thought the answer was obvious. He wasn’t breaking </span>
  <em>
    <span>into </span>
  </em>
  <span>the bank with the intent to </span>
  <em>
    <span>steal. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He was just visiting.) And the goblins left him be unless he happened to wander somewhere he shouldn't.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Bill tugged on the bottom of his ponytail and groaned something a bit too low for Ron to hear. “Why is it every time you come here, the goblins call me?” Bill eventually hissed, his hands pressed harshly against his eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well,” Ron said, his head tilting to the side to track Gi’lian scampering through the shadows behind Bill’s back, “not every time. Just whenever they know you’re not tangled up in a job.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Honestly, it wasn’t as if Ron wasn’t safe. He told the tellers when he arrived and he never went into any of the vaults. So, maybe sometimes he got a little roughed up (his nose tickled with the drying blood) and sometimes he stayed overnight, but it wasn’t like he was </span>
  <em>
    <span>stealing.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Besides, the goblins only called Bill if (or when) Ron had finally managed to annoy a teller or he had spent too much time down in the Below. (Time didn't always work the way it was supposed to, down in the Below, so sometimes Ron went days before Bill was called to fetch him. Other times, Ron would only be scampering through the Below for a mere handful of hours.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Merlin’s balls, you stole a dragon. Didn’t you? You stole a dragon from Charlie! That’s how you got here! Ron, you little f….” Bill’s finger’s shot out to twist into Ron’s collar and the boy gave a quick ‘meep’ as he suddenly found himself being dragged towards the floo. Snaggletooth, (Ron loathed that little rat bastard. The moment he had been given a pronounceable Above Name, he had become a menace to the halls, always lording his right to the Above as a reason to shove Ron and the other goblin kids off the tracks and into dusty corners.) laughed as he walked by, lantern swinging from a gnarled hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron was rather proud of that hand. It had taken a week to get the timing right for the vault door to give away </span>
  <em>
    <span>just so. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Snaggletooth would never be able to be a teller now, unable to move his knuckles in the correct twitches to send coins flying through the shadows.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron bared his teeth in a silent snicker as something snaked across the ground and tripped Snaggletooth up. Pity the goblin wasn’t hurt. (He still stumbled though, so Ron would take the victory as it was.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Romanian Dragon Preserve, Charlie Weasley.” Bill shouted as he threw in what Ron privately thought was a touch more powder than necessary.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>However, this was Charlie they were talking about. One needed lots of fire, a wrym, or dragon to properly gain his attention, so an out of control floo would at least give Bill five minutes. If he bothered to unlock his floo that is.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Honestly Bill," Ron choked out as his brother stared into the floo, waiting for Charlie to pop up like a bad gnome, "why would I go all the way to Romania, steal a dragon, and then come </span>
  <em>
    <span>back</span>
  </em>
  <span>?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well, why would he go to Romania, steal a dragon, and come back, </span>
  <em>
    <span>again</span>
  </em>
  <span>? (Not that Bill knew that of course.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Stealing a dragon was actually rather easy, when you got past the fact that a dragon was rather large, breathed fire, and could snap up a wixen without breaking a sweat. All one needed was a bit of raw meat, the ability to stand extremely still, and a rather long rope. (Having a group of goblins willing to stand by and help smuggle the dragon past multiple wards and pour water on any of the fires that broke out, was also convenient.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But that was besides the point and Bill didn't need to know that little adventure. There was also the fact that the dragon rather liked being down by the low vaults from what the tellers told him. The poor thing got to eat any thieves that stumbled into its nest and apparently it kept trying to hoard some of the more adventurous goblin children that tried to pet it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Besides, Charlie had been moaning for years about how the reserve simply didn't have enough funds to help all the dragons they found. So stealing the dragon had been a good thing and a win-win situation all the way around. (The fact Ron had gone and stolen a dragon, may or may not have been because of a dare, but that wasn't the point either.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I mean, really Bill. If anyone is going to smuggle a dragon, it would be Charlie!"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron knew he had stalled Bill's racing thoughts from the moment his brother had shut the grate on the floo and let go of Ron's collar. Prudently, the boy took a step back and out of the range of his brother's hands. (Ron was the youngest of six boys. Knowing how to dodge his brothers' hands had been a vital survival skill.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"We," Bill snapped out, his face twisting into a resigned sort of look Ron often saw on their father's face, "are going to the offices so I can get my next </span>
  <em>
    <span>job </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>you </span>
  </em>
  <span>can be sent </span>
  <em>
    <span>home.</span>
  </em>
  <span>"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I can just use the floo for that." Ron pointed out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Ronald."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"What? I can just use the floo!"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Bill did not look overly impressed by this jump of logic and Ron wisely shut his mouth with a sharp nod. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nobody had any sense of humor today it seemed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Getting to the offices was pretty easy, all things considered. Ron didn't know what time it was in the Above, but it seemed in the Below, the lunch rush had hit. There were </span>
  <em>
    <span>things </span>
  </em>
  <span>in the shadows. Thin brittle fingers created gouges in the floor, bright eyes floated at knee height, beings scuttled over the walls, their joints pressed and twisted the wrong way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron still wasn't sure if Bill could </span>
  <em>
    <span>see </span>
  </em>
  <span>the things skittering through the shadows, but he seemed rather adapt at staying out of their way. At least, Bill managed to somehow duck the swings claws and miss the teeth that snapped at his fingers. Which, from the looks of things, either meant Bill saw worse things down in Egypt or he simply noticed nothing at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Could go either way really.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He knew his parents certainly didn't notice anything when they came to fetch him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, Ron made sure to wave and step side anything and everyone that wandered across his path. It meant he scrambled down the halls of the bank a bit like Ginny did when she was playing hopscotch, but Ron would rather that then cross one of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>things</span>
  </em>
  <span>. And if being in the Below had taught him anything, it was that annoying the </span>
  <em>
    <span>things </span>
  </em>
  <span>in the shadows was never a clever move. So, Ron made sure to use the manners his mother had scrubbed into his skull and sent acknowledgement to anything that eyed him up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(If he also made sure to bare his teeth at anything that snapped at him, that was neither here nor there.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, when they got to the offices, Ron stumbled to a halt. There was not much that could phase the boy. He grappled with goblin children, he raced down the vault tracks, and he even knew the difference between the Above and the Below simply by where he was standing in the bank. Simply put, Ron knew most things in the bank, if only by reputation or description, but he didn't know what </span>
  <em>
    <span>that was.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Bill shoved him down into a seat outside of the office before Ron could back a step back and flee to the Below.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Stay here and don't even think about using the floo. I'm bringing you home to mum, myself." Bill grit out between clenched teeth, his hand tight on Ron's shoulder.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron wanted to tell Bill that giving him over to mum, even gift wrapped with a bow, would do nothing at all. Oh sure, there would be a lecture and mum would keep a closer eye on him for about a week, but inevitably, the twins would cause a ruckus or Ginny would whine about something, and Ron would slip between the cracks again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(This wasn't Ron's first rodeo.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead, Ron gave his brother a quick nod and went back to looking at the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>across the hall from him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"What are you here for?" A waspish voice called out after a few minutes of tense silence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron near fell out of his seat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Beside the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing</span>
  </em>
  <span>, was a little girl. Ron wasn't entirely sure how he hadn't seen her sitting there before. She had a snowy owl perched on her knee and a hand clasped with an errant tendril of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing.</span>
  </em>
  <span> There was nothing overly </span>
  <em>
    <span>off </span>
  </em>
  <span>about her, if one discounted the hair that seemed to bounce up and around forever and teeth that looked a bit sharp behind glittery pink lips. She looked rather human, all things considered.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Ron knew better than to think appearances were accurate or even equated nature.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Technically? I'm being sent home, but according to my brother, I broke in." Ron replied automatically, his gaze firmly stuck on the little girl across from him. He might have only been eleven, but he knew better than to look something like </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>in the eye.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The girl raised an eyebrow. "What are you </span>
  <em>
    <span>really </span>
  </em>
  <span>here for then?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"To check up on a dragon." Ron responded after a moment, his brow furrowing as he glanced off to the side. "And cause I was bored."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was a soft sort of tickle trailing over his shoulders and down his spine. Long fluttering claws gently nicked his jumper and traced patterns over his bones.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I'm Hermione Granger." The girl said, her voice echoing down a long tunnel to reach Ron's ears. "And I suppose this is Ri. Ri Evans? I think. I didn't really catch a last name."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>twisted its head with a resounding </span>
  <em>
    <span>crack</span>
  </em>
  <span> and Ron reminded himself it would not do to stop breathing. There was a haze of smoke, might have been shadows for all Ron could </span>
  <em>
    <span>see</span>
  </em>
  <span>, in front of him. On his shoulders, the endless claws gently tapped down the row, each stab tearing a bit more of his jumper.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron closed his eyes. It was not smart to stare into an abyss, even if the abyss happened to be looking back. (One never knew what they would notice after all. Or if they would be noticed back.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wasn't going to think about the fact even the darkest part of the shadows in the hall had stretched towards the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing.</span>
  </em>
  <span> He wasn't going to wonder why the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>flickered a bit like a badly tuned muggle Teevee. Ron wasn't going to wonder or think about a lot of things. (It was safer that way.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A cold finger poked his cheek.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron opened his eyes again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing</span>
  </em>
  <span> stood in front of him, static and unmoving. Unchanging. Toxic green eyes bled out from under a sweeping crackle of scarred lightning crossing over half of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing's </span>
  </em>
  <span>face. Blue lips, dark enough to almost be black, split over sharp milk teeth better suited for a furious crup pup or a draconian hatchling. Dark hair wafted around the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing's </span>
  </em>
  <span>head on an untouchable breeze, and Ron couldn't help but shudder at the sight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I see you!" The </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing</span>
  </em>
  <span> said, its voice raspy and layered. There was a sort of excitement in that tone, the overlapping voices echoing happily with worn out throats.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron blinked, every single instinct in his brain screaming at him to stay still.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron wasn't a memorable child. He wasn't the seventh son. He had not been born under an auspicious star. He had no prophecy hanging over his head, and he was the very definition of a normal. Ron was not a child that people would think to take note of, but sometimes, Ron did memorable things.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron stayed still.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily Potter had been rushed. Her wards were slap-shod at best and had been driven by the simple order of </span>
  <em>
    <span>hide and protect.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Petunia Evans, not magical enough to be a witch but not mundane enough to be muggle, took one look at her nephew and had gained a whole boy hidden away in her closet. The sad fact of Harry Potter's existence was that everyone noticed him, but no one had ever </span>
  <em>
    <span>seen </span>
  </em>
  <span>him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The wards were pleased.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily would have been horrified.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ronald Weasley, a child who regularly stole himself away to play in the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below, </span>
  </em>
  <span>took one more look at the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>in the hall and decided 'why not?'. (The </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>was probably safer then the girl. At least the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>was honest about its appearance and fair with it's truths.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron held out a hand. "Ron," (he knew better than to give his full name,) and leaned forward a touch, "and I see you too."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>settled. Black tendrils curled back into the flat surface of it's shadow and the lashing aura Ron had been decidedly </span>
  <em>
    <span>not noticing </span>
  </em>
  <span>calmed. (It may have also linked a hand around Ron's wrist the same way Hermione had been claimed, but Ron was decidedly </span>
  <em>
    <span>not noticing </span>
  </em>
  <span>that either.) Ron blinked, and between one heartbeat and the next, the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>rippled and stretched until Ron was no longer looking at a </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>but a boy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If this was what the </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing </span>
  </em>
  <span>liked to masquerade as, Ron was not going to ask what the girl actually looked like. He rather liked his eyes in his skull and his tongue in his mouth, thank you very much!</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Mine?" The boy asked with a quick blink, his head tilting to the side with another unsettling </span>
  <em>
    <span>crack</span>
  </em>
  <span>. (His head may have also hung just a little bit past what Ron would consider </span>
  <em>
    <span>normal </span>
  </em>
  <span>but who was he to comment?)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Later, Ron would wonder if this was the moment that had decided the future, but for now, Ron hesitated. The hesitation wasn't born of maliciousness or cruelty. He didn't mean to make Ri curl down and into himself. Truly, he hadn't meant to be mean at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Ron routinely tumbled through the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He had a missing tooth and blood drying slowly on his face. He knew better then to give his name and he certainly knew better then to give his </span>
  <em>
    <span>self </span>
  </em>
  <span>over to Ri.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Ron was not a memorable child but sometimes he did memorable things.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"As much as you are mine." Ron replied carefully, his eyes sparking and his grin crooked.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri positively grinned, blue lips stretched over sharp teeth. "Mine." He agreed easily, his hand slipping around Ron's wrist.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron went easily enough when Ri began to tug him back towards the bench Ri and Hermione had been previously occupying. The girl simply shifted a bit further down the seat, absently making room for the two boys to sit beside her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then, they were on the bench. Ri was somehow a physical presence between them and not at the same time. It was sort of odd, Ron thought in amusement, how Ri flickered in his sight. The boy was obviously there. There was no mistaking that Ri's head was a weight leaning against his shoulder, but at the same time, the thin tendril coiling around his wrist like an overly affectionate cat was somehow a thin bird boned hand and somehow </span>
  <em>
    <span>not.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(There was nothing wrong with Ri.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron frowned.</span>
</p><p><span>(</span><b>There </b><span>was </span><b>nothing </b><b><em>wrong</em></b> <span>with </span><b>Ri</b><span>.)</span></p><p>
  <span>He flipped his hand over and threaded his fingers with Ri. Of course there was nothing wrong with Ri. They were on the edge of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below. </span>
  </em>
  <span>It was normal for visages and forms to flicker between the realms.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It's normal for…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron was not a stupid boy, not now and not ever. Sometimes it took time for things to develop or even for all the pieces to connect, but what else could one expect? He was only a child after all, even the brightest eleven year old could not understand everything instantaneously. But he was also a child who was routinely challenged by riddles that would stump even Ravenclaws. (Not that he knew it. Ron was used to logic games and would never have the sheer physical strength of a goblin. Compared to his peers in the bank, he was behind. Compared to his peers at school? Well, he would never be a Ravenclaw but he would give a few third years a run for their money.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron grew up learning to read not from the family primers but from the runes and the wixen languages scrawled across plaques on the vaults. In this, he had a slightly unfair advantage of not only knowing the names of most (if not all) the wizarding families in the British Isles, but how many of the families were connected.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(There was nothing wrong with </span>
  <em>
    <span>Ri</span>
  </em>
  <span>.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron sat in the hall and tilted his head so that it rested on top of Ri’s. Of course there was nothing wrong with...</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Blue lips. Cold fingers. Bird bone hands. Lightning storm scars. Pale skin. Toxic eyes…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lightening scars...</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The plaques of numerous vaults flashed behind his eyes and Ron picked up names and discarded them just as quickly. Assuming this boy was wixen at all then...</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ree.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Rry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Har-ry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ri.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Potter?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No, the girl said…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Evans.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily Potter nee </span>
  <em>
    <span>Evans</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ron grinned.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Boy Who Lived. (Now isn't that ironic?)</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I did not expect this to blow up the way it did, so I mean, YAY!<br/>Continue reading and comment down below if you have questions.<br/>For further clarification:<br/>Names:<br/>giving away your name is giving away your FULL name, middle names included. No, Hermione is not in danger, she hasn't given away the middle name yet.<br/>Above and Below:<br/>Above is the regular world, no distinction between muggle and wixen worlds. Above is everything that is purely 'human'.<br/>Below is kinda like fey worlds. Theoretically, the bank and the forbidden forest, are in-between places. It's why Bill gets called to pick up Ron if Ron goes further into the 'in-between' and ends up in full goblin territory. It's also why Ron notes that time gets wonky, if he goes fully into the Below, he's not being affected by the Above rules anymore and things get weird.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Bloodtests and Unexpected Results</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey Everybody,<br/>Sorry for the late posting, I got a contract that was time sensitive and I just finished that up. And then there were exams, (which I passed, YAY!) and then a bunch of other minor things that popped up that meant lots of driving and then falling into bed every night without being able to write.<br/>But anyway, a new chapter with lots of new information. I know one part of it is gonna make people go WOW REALLY??? to which I reply, SPOILERS THE ANSWER IS COMING SOON<br/>AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA<br/>As always, have fun, enjoy, and please don't shoot me!<br/>-Lost</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Humans were such troublesome creatures, Hookfang thought with a slight sneer, they always tended to make the oddest scenes and bring out the weirdest situations. Overall, humans were fundamentally useless. The only good thing about the species was that they found gold to be of value. Although, that the humans thought gold was useful as </span>
  <em>
    <span>money </span>
  </em>
  <span>of all things made Hookfang shake his head. No, gold was useful for rituals and adornments. It held very little value as </span>
  <em>
    <span>money.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>But if the humans were willing to allow the power over their currencies to go to the goblins, then on their heads it be. (Power is the real currency of the world, not that humans seem to know it.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang had been the Potter account manager since the late Lord Fleamont Potter had taken up the lordship. And Hookfang had taken the account just like father before him, and his grandmother before him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang was not a young goblin by any means, but he was not yet past his prime either. Not even pushing three hundred, he had a rather long time to go before he had to begin bringing in his daughter to pick up the account and continue the business with the Potters. He, at least, had been lucky. His account had not folded away into oblivion with the last minor civil war the humans had spat up in the past two decades.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No, his account had </span>
  <em>
    <span>grown.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>(But Hookfang would only stay with this power if this </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>was exactly what the squib claimed.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang looked down at the </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>wrapped around the human girl and wondered how he had ever gotten to be so lucky. Little Lord Potter was shaping up to be an interesting specimen. Hookfang waggled a finger and nearly chuckled when half a dozen shadow hands mimicked the motion back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh yes, little Lord Potter was shaping up to be very interesting indeed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It could take decades of grooming to get a lord up to an acceptable standard. Decades of subtly pushing and prodding a lord and heir apparent’s natural magicks to be able to even </span>
  <em>
    <span>see </span>
  </em>
  <span>let alone </span>
  <em>
    <span>notice </span>
  </em>
  <span>the Below. Hookfang had put in just over two decades into James Potter. Two decades of poking the then heir to at least </span>
  <em>
    <span>see </span>
  </em>
  <span>the shadows of the Below peering out into the Above. Two decades Hookfang had been drilling the boy into eventually being able to notice and acknowledge the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>And then the damn human had gone and gotten himself killed! All without bothering to warn Hookfang about it too!</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But the Little Lord? The one standing in his office?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang hid a grin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This one needed no training.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Beside the Little Lord, the squib sank back down into her seat after having called the children in from the hall, her mouth set in a thin line. Hookfang didn't blame her, he too would be putting out an honour call when this meeting was over. He was duty bound to do so. The Potters had no </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>blood in their veins (which was why it took so bloody </span>
  <em>
    <span>long </span>
  </em>
  <span>to train up a lord) which meant this Little Lord had to have inherited the bloodline from his </span>
  <em>
    <span>mother. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And to think, an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>child lost in the bowels of the mundane world in the Above? Hookfang was surprised no </span>
  <em>
    <span>Other </span>
  </em>
  <span>had let out a call for a Wild Hunt</span>
  <em>
    <span>. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Hookfang missed when the Wild Hunt had been common. His blood hadn’t pumped like that in </span>
  <em>
    <span>decades.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh, the favours Hookfang would bring to his clan when the </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>child was returned to the Below. The power that he would hold at his beck and call. But the question was; was the boy a son of an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>or the grandson? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang's nails clicked on top of his desk as he thought this particular problem through.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Other </span>
  </em>
  <span>children grew to maturity so slowly that Hookfang almost didn't believe what he was seeing when the squib had brought the child into the office. But there was no doubt about it, the child was </span>
  <em>
    <span>other, </span>
  </em>
  <span>he could not be mistaken for anything else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yes. There was only one thing for it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang gestured to the sharp dagger at the end of the desk. “Three drops of blood, Little Lord.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord quirked his head and Hookfang nearly shivered at the resounding </span>
  <em>
    <span>crack </span>
  </em>
  <span>that echoed through the office.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squib sniffed. “He wants you to bleed, </span>
  <em>
    <span>boy.</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little human girl turned her head and pat at the nearest arm. “Just like in the stories. Only, I think you are more handsome than Briar Rose.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If the girl's parents weren't so horrified by the office, Hookfang rather thought they might protest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, he turned his attention back to the children. It was fascinating the way the ‘boy’ rippled and for a quick moment, Hookfang could </span>
  <em>
    <span>see. </span>
  </em>
  <span>It wasn’t long, and he only caught a glimpse, but that was enough. Hookfang was impressed, most </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>could barely retain a human shape but this boy switched between the two as if no one form could hold him for long.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The human guise was Lord and Lady Potter’s child, no doubt. The Potter hair tumbled down over Lady Lily’s eyes and the infamous scar branched over the boy’s face. From the hand that lifted towards the dagger, Hookfang was curious to see the late Lady Euphemia’s delicate fingers and stocky wrists. The boy also had blue lips, blackened fingertips, and pale skin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>However, it was the second guise that held Hookfang’s attention.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang had learned long ago at his grandmother’s knee that names only gave power. To define a thing, to give it a </span>
  <em>
    <span>name, </span>
  </em>
  <span>gave the thing access to this world. Hookfang was too old, too set in his ways, to ever breach the taboo of naming the creature that sired the boy, but he could hazard a guess.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One did not live for long if they threw </span>
  <em>
    <span>names </span>
  </em>
  <span>around.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(There were very few names that made goblins nervous and there were even fewer that they barely dared to </span>
  <em>
    <span>think.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord was all wisps and shadows. Humanoid if only as a nod to his primary guise. If anything, Hookfang thought the Little Lord was a little human boy, flickering and wobbling like a newly born thestral foal.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang had only had the pleasure of meeting an obscurial once. The child had been on the brink of exhaustion and unable to hold the pieces of her soul together for the length of time necessary to bind her back to this world. This boy was no obscurial, but Hookfang thought the boy was the closest anyone could get without becoming one. A child trapped between two planes, two existences.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Hookfang did not pity the child as much as he wondered how long the Little Lord would last.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang narrowed his eyes and placed a spelled paper beside the dagger. Offering a second one along with a small knife from his belt to the little human girl when she pouted. (Hookfang remembered his daughter's tantrums too clearly to ever try and annoy a human girl. His daughter's lungs had been strong enough to grant her a position on the guards to the </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>vaults. He did not want to test what hidden talents the girl who clung to an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>might be hiding.) He did not expect much to come from the little girl's test, but he had his suspicions about the Little Lord.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang dragged both papers back towards him as the children allowed three drops of blood to fall. The little human girl actually counted as precisely as he would expect from a teller, her finger twitching with every drop. He looked at the human girl first. Hermione Granger, the paper proclaimed, the first of her line.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang expected nothing less. Oh, there might have been a squib somewhere in her history, but most likely the throwback to a so-called human purebred line was five to six generations ago. Hermione was new blood and if Hookfang played his cards well enough, he might be able place her favour in his own. Only time would tell what heights the girl reached, but Hookfang was of the opinion that anyone who could hang off an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>and keep their eyes in their head, was going to go far.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He gave the paper back to the girl. Lips twitching as she plucked it politely from his hands and all but threw herself into her father's hold. The paper was shoved quickly into his face and Hookfang hid his snicker by looking down at the second (and more interesting) test.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Inheritance tests were broken into several different types, each used to explain a particular feature in the entities' blood. The general test Hookfang had given the girl was one the bank provided for a few sickles at most. It told of the maternal and paternal bloodline and if there were any magical inheritances. It did not tell abilities and it certainly did not tell the true </span>
  <em>
    <span>name.</span>
  </em>
  <span> (No test ever did.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The paper Hookfang had given to the Little Lord was a bit more in depth. He didn't need a read of blood linked vaults, he had that in the portfolio, but he did need a genealogical test. And this? This is where things could get complicated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang wasn't quite sure what he was looking for. Had no idea if the boy was half </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>or quarter. (Maybe, just maybe, he was something else altogether.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy's inheritance had to have come from the mother. How Hookfang had missed </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>all those years ago, he wasn't sure. Lady Potter had to have passed down the traits. (There was a difference, after all, between suspecting and knowing. Hookfang might suspect what the boy is, but it is another thing entirely to </span>
  <em>
    <span>know.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Harry Potter, the paper said, the blood blooming out across the page in a quick scrawl. Well, Hookfang thought, at least he knew the squib had been telling the truth </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then he watched as the blood sank further down the page. (And he rather wished he hadn’t.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The maternal line held only one name and Lady Lily’s name was devastatingly </span>
  <em>
    <span>human. </span>
  </em>
  <span>There were no marks for species or acknowledgement of legacy for the child nor were there any indication that the child should be as he was. There was a moment where Hookfang nearly growled at himself, as assumptions and theories fell away and reorganized themselves in his mind. Of course Lady Lily had been human, her full blood sister sat before him as a squib.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Which meant the boy had to have inherited the blood from his father. Which made no </span>
  <em>
    <span>sense, </span>
  </em>
  <span>the Potter’s were as mundane as they came. Unless, of course, the boy’s blood had something to do with the so-called Dark Lord. Hookfang nearly scoffed at the thought. The Dark Lord. The man was nothing of the sort. He held no ability to </span>
  <em>
    <span>see</span>
  </em>
  <span>, let alone notice, and he disregarded the very principles the world was built on.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No, Tom Riddle was no dark lord.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The paternal line, Hookfang saw, was not what he was expecting in the least. The late Lord James Potter was first in line, closely followed by the Black Heir. Hookfang remembered the Black heir, it was hard not to. The boy was a Black through and through, although by Lady Walburga’s claims, he was nothing of the sort. But school houses and temperament did not matter as much to goblins as did the natural magicks. Sirius Black, former ward of the Potter line, had the Black magics practically oozing out of his ears.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Blacks had </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>blood running through their veins and try as the late Lady Walburga might to deny it, heir Sirius Black was more </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>than even his father. That boy had needed no training (at least, not in the abilities to acknowledge the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Above </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below</span>
  </em>
  <span>). But still, even a blood adoption would not explain the Little Lord.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But, then, under both those paternal claims, was a third. On one hand, Hookfang was not too bewildered. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Others</span>
  </em>
  <span> often switched and rolled between genders (or none at all) so often they rarely were written down as anything aside from 'parent', if they were the individual who placed claim through any form of adoption. On the other hand, Hookfang had not been expecting to see </span>
  <em>
    <span>that</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That </span>
  <em>
    <span>Other</span>
  </em>
  <span> had many different names and in truth, Hookfang had never known that </span>
  <em>
    <span>Other</span>
  </em>
  <span> to personally interact with the mortal worlds. Oh, one saw their influence everywhere, but rarely did that </span>
  <em>
    <span>Other </span>
  </em>
  <span>place themself onto this plane. Hookfang's jaw clenched and ever so slowly, he looked up to meet the gaze of the Little Lord. The boy was perched on the edge of the desk, head tilted too far to be normal.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang, who dealt with other and the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below </span>
  </em>
  <span>on a daily basis, tried not to shiver. None of this made sense. That symbol should not be there!</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And truly, Hookfang thought with a pained grimace, there was only one person who might know. And, well, there was no delicate way to ask, was there?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"What do you remember of the night your parents were…" Hookfang trailed off, scrambling for a word that was not as distressing as murder. (He did not want an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>child to </span>
  <em>
    <span>scream </span>
  </em>
  <span>in his office, thank you very much. Especially not with </span>
  <em>
    <span>that </span>
  </em>
  <span>symbol on the boy's bloodline.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy blinked too many eyes at him, his hands fluttering over the dagger on the desk. "Murdered?" The child supplied almost a touch too enthusiastically.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Out of the corner of his eye, Hookfang noticed that the Gangers were looking a bit too pale. Their daughter on the other hand, simply patted the Little Lord's head comfortingly. "We'll get them," she said sweetly as the Little Lord nuzzled into her hand, "it can't be too hard."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Grangers looked ready to faint at that pronouncement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The owl on the girl's shoulder hooted once, the wings fluttering in such a way Hookfang swore he could </span>
  <em>
    <span>see </span>
  </em>
  <span>shadows slipping between the white of her feathers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"The Dark Man." The Little Lord rasped, a happy little grin pulling at his lips to show far too many teeth for Hookfang's continued survival unless the goblin stepped </span>
  <em>
    <span>very carefully.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>"To clarify," Hookfang said quickly, not at all interested in having his daughter take his position this early in her career, "you do not mean Lord Voldemort?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord scrunched up his nose and let loose a sound that resembled a hiss, but only if one considered crumbling glaciers and roaring waves to be a mortal sound. "Not </span>
  <em>
    <span>him.</span>
  </em>
  <span>"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ah. Okay then. That still left too many mortals for the boy to be talking about in general terms. Hookfang licked at his lips. His daughter was so much better at gaining this sort of information. On the edge of his desk, the boy flipped the dagger between snatching hands and trailing shadows, all without taking most of his eyes away from Hookfang.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the silence, his human guise slipped just that much further.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"The Dark Man." The boy whispered with a revenant croon. "Daddy. He brings the most wonderful </span>
  <em>
    <span>presents.</span>
  </em>
  <span>"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh by the darkness of the Below. Hookfang was too old to be dealing with this sort of turnabout. Wincing, he placed the paper down on the table, turning it so the Little Lord wouldn't have to </span>
  <em>
    <span>twist </span>
  </em>
  <span>to see it. With one gnarled finger, he tapped the paper. "This…"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Man? Being? Entity?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dare Hookfang say anything in case he offended the…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was two seconds away from hysterics and Hookfang did not like this one bit. Thankfully (or maybe not, Hookfang wasn't too sure yet), the boy simply hummed in agreement as he tugged aside the collar of his shirt to show his right shoulder. (Hookfang nearly let loose a strangled gasp.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh no.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Deathly Hallows were inked in a sickly black into the child's shoulder. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh! Pretty!” Hermione whispered as she leaned over and looked at the tattoo. In disbelief, Hookfang watched as the entirely human little girl placed a finger on the ink and traced it. “What’s it mean?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Slowly, Hookfang shifted a bit in his chair and tried to double check the little girl’s blood test. She was human. Right?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had to be mortal at the very least?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(No one. Absolutely no one, was stupid enough to lay a hand on </span>
  <em>
    <span>his </span>
  </em>
  <span>child.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang cleared his throat, pleased that the humans in the office (aside from the girl) jumped as if prodded by a battle axe. “That symbol means…” He paused, instinct warring with the need to voice the sheer disbelief that was currently coating his bones.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord practically purred under the girl's hand. "Dad."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The girl beamed at the response and Hookfang was definitely too old to be dealing with </span>
  <em>
    <span>any of this. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He desperately wanted to put his head in his hands. There was the prestige of being an account manager for an Olde family, and then there was this. This, this was very much above his pay grade.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At the same time, there was also the realization that Hookfang had just become the account manager of a child of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oldest Other. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The honour Hookfang would be able to bring to his Clan, to his </span>
  <em>
    <span>Court.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Because, in his office, was the adopted child of </span>
  <em>
    <span>Death.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>How that had happened, was anyone's guess.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was not going to touch the fact that Little Lord Potter called the oldest entity in the world, Daddy. Or the fact that the boy's parent (Dad? Uncle? Above and Below, Hookfang had no words for this mess,)  brought him gifts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were only two good things about learning that fact. The first was the pale shade the squib turned. The colours humans could change was utterly fascinating, in that they did it via </span>
  <em>
    <span>blood </span>
  </em>
  <span>rather than magic or dyes. The second was that Hookfang could be secure in the knowledge he did not have to find a way to send out a letter to, well, Death, to inform him (them?) of parental rights.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>By the Above, Hookfang was going to have to deal with </span>
  <em>
    <span>Death.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Nothing about this was normal.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(But there was </span>
  <em>
    <span>nothing </span>
  </em>
  <span>wrong with the Little Lord.)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang cleared his throat, desperate to drag everyone back on track. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the Little Lord, but Hookfang still had a job to do, shell shocked or not. Slowly, Hookfang offered the squib the blood test. He was not surprised when the woman simply shook her head and raised a hand in denial.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pity.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"You asked for the Evans account." Hookfang finally managed to rasp, his tongue sticking to his teeth the moment the boy turned and fixed him with an interested stare.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squib hesitated only for a moment. "Yes." She said, her fingers twisting over and over in the strap of her purse, “I know,” the squib paused, her lips twisting down into a frown, “I </span>
  <em>
    <span>think </span>
  </em>
  <span>my sister would have left money for her son, if she was anything like our mother.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang merely blinked. “You are not here for the Potter account?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squib sniffed as if the very name was an affront to her wellbeing. “Of course not,” she snapped, “Lily Evans died unmarried. If the boy’s father has not come to claim him by now, then I want nothing to do with him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The office was silent for a long moment as the adults all stared at the squib in confusion. The squib sniffed one more time. “I do not want </span>
  <em>
    <span>charity.</span>
  </em>
  <span>” The last word was spat like a curse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Had no one else heard the Little Lord claim the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oldest Other </span>
  </em>
  <span>as a fourth parent? Hookfang thought a bit desperately, shooting a look towards the Grangers who were looking just as lost as he was feeling. Did she not know the Lord and Lady Potter had died ending a war?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The Late Lady Potter was married for just over a year before her passing.” Hookfang said, his fingers tapping the top of the desk in an unsettling rhythm. He happened to know that the bonds and announcements had been sent out, even if they had been a bit rushed. He had been the goblin to settle the debts and the funds for the marriage after all. "And she died alongside her husband, in defence of their son."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In truth, the late Lady Potter had been mourned twice over, once by her own people and once by the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below. </span>
  </em>
  <span>For a New Blood, she had been surprisingly adept at being able to </span>
  <em>
    <span>notice </span>
  </em>
  <span>the </span>
  <em>
    <span>other. </span>
  </em>
  <span>She could have gone far, if only because of that skill alone. And the goblins mourned the loss of that skill, even as they acknowledged her death as the most important way a mother could die.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Protecting her own.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, there was something awful about what the squib was saying. In fact, there were several awful things about what the squib was saying. The first was the thought that a wixen family would not want any child who was so very obviously </span>
  <em>
    <span>other. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The second was that the squib, and by extension, the boy, had no idea of who he was at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang almost didn’t want to ask. “What do you know of the Boy-Who-Lived?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He received several blank stares as an answer. Part of Hookfang despaired at the realization he was going to have to explain </span>
  <em>
    <span>everything </span>
  </em>
  <span>to a squib and the parents of a New Blood. Another part of him desperately threw a look towards the Little Lord, who was happily wrapped around the baby witch.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang quickly looked away from the Little Lord. The image of flashing teeth and blinking eyes searing into his brain. And then, of course there was also the laughter. The soft rasping thing that trailed through the shadows and licked at Hookfang's spine.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord sas laughing and Hookfang wasn't sure he wanted to know why.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>However, the larger part of Hookfang </span>
  <em>
    <span>raged. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He had spent years trying to contact the Little Lord. He had spent agonizing hours down in the Below, merging vaults and monitoring properties. He had relocated house elves and wiggled through tiny loopholes to keep money flowing through the active accounts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And every time Hookfang had gotten close to finding out where the Little Lord had been hidden away, his magical guardian had blocked communication, citing danger and darkness in every corner. And, every attempt Hookfang had made to try and find out who the magical guardian was, had been batted down and pushed to the side. He had been waiting for this day for </span>
  <em>
    <span>years, </span>
  </em>
  <span>if only so that he could finally open the accounts again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But everyone knew a squib could be a magical guardian. They simply couldn’t use wands, there were other ways to utilize magic then with a foci. Yet, if this squib didn’t even know who </span>
  <em>
    <span>Harry was, </span>
  </em>
  <span>then the woman was not to bear the brunt of Hookfang’s rage. (The fact was, the boy did not know how to be an heir, a lord, or even a proper wixen. He knew nothing of his heritage, and what Hookfang would not give to have the late Lord Potter back, even with his ignorance of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below.</span>
  </em>
  <span>)</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang itched to have his axe in hand as he mentally went through the list of people who could have blocked the boy from the bank. It was not the first time Hookfang had done so, but it was the first time that he had done the mental tally and been able to actively change things, what with the Little Lord in his office and able to grant leave for him to hunt down the idiot who dared to stop the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“There are some things I need to verify.” Hookfang said after a long moment, his lips twisting up into a nasty smile. (The Little Lord perked up at the expression and for the first time, Hookfang wanted to </span>
  <em>
    <span>coo. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Such a bloodthirsty Little Lord, Hookfang was blessed to have such a patron.) “I advise you go to the tellers and ask for the Potter school funds. It is not charity,” Hookfang said quickly as the squib looked ready to argue, “it pulls equally from your sister’s account."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The squib looked appeased by this answer. The Grangers looked just as confused as they had when they walked into his office little more than an hour ago.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"As for you," Hookfang continued, his gaze flicking towards the little girl who had shown no fear, "go to a teller and ask for a conversion to gallons and sickles for roughly," Hookfang did some quick mental math, conversion rates and deduction fees racing through his head, "four hundred pounds. If you do not have that in pocket, ask for a cover from the New Blood grant. All we ask is at some point in the future, you replace the money you have taken out, no interest incurring on the loan."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Grangers and the squib nodded, seemingly pleased to finally have some direction to move towards. Taking his words as a dismissal, the adults stood and began to walk out of his office in a daze.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The children, however, did not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The girl squinted at him, her head tilted to the side as if she were listening to some great puzzle and Hookfang happened to have the answer key.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"What do you need to check?" She asked suddenly, her fingers absently stroking one of the Little Lord's wrists. "And why can't we be here for it? Oh! And, are you going to contact us later to tell us what we need to do next?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang's eyebrows climbed higher on his forehead. This was a smart one, wasn't she?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The boy hissed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang leveled the Little Lord with an unimpressed look. "I need to speak to your godfather."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Little Lord rippled. "Daddy?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gods above, no! Hookfang was not about to summon </span>
  <em>
    <span>Death </span>
  </em>
  <span>of all beings, just for a quick conversation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"No. I am going to call Sirius Black." Hookfang said, forcing himself not to whimper at the thought of the ritual needed to call upon the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Old Others</span>
  </em>
  <span>. "He may have set something up to keep you from being found."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What he didn't say was that Black might know how the Little Lord had been adopted by an <em>Other</em>, let alone <em>that other. </em></span>
  <span>The Little Lord hummed, his mouth twisting into a thoughtful slash. </span>
  <span>Hookfang leaned forward over the desk, his hand inching towards his own axe. "And when I find out, I will owl you."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The girl nodded once, fingers twitching up to settle in the down off the owl on her shoulder. For a moment, the children shared a look between them. The Little Lord twitched and shivered, hovering between </span>
  <em>
    <span>Above </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>Below. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The girl seemed not to care. Then, the two children bowed low and left the office.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang leaned back, satisfaction and relief curling through his veins. The Blacks were never an easy family to deal with, but they were certainly better than an </span>
  <em>
    <span>other </span>
  </em>
  <span>child and </span>
  <em>
    <span>Death</span>
  </em>
  <span>. The door closed behind the two children with a thump, and Hookfang absently put a hand down to fiddle with the blade at his hip.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead, he only grasped thin air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hookfang paused. How had…?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little girl, he had given his blade to the little girl. And an item freely given, did not have to be returned. Hookfang put his head in his hands. He didn’t have to look at the edge of his desk to know that the blood test and the dagger had disappeared as well. Hookfang couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face as he began to chuckle.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yes, the Little Lord was certainly shaping up to be interesting indeed.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>You made it all the way to the end, YAY</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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